The Adventures of A 4 Day Weekend : Part 2

Goal #4: Something New Every Month
Instead of doing one thing new this month, I decided to do a whole bunch of new things and stack it into some forced, use-it-or-loose-it 4 day vaca-stay-cay.

Day 3: Saturday
Getty Villa

Jordan, Ryan and I picked up Sarah in Lake Forest and met Kris and Becky at the beautiful Getty Villa in Malibu.

So some background on the place. It was once Mr. Getty's house, who collected art. Then he got so much art that he dedicated a wing of his house to it. Then he thought that it was wrong to keep it all to himself, so he started opening his art wing to the public by appointment only. But he only saw maybe 1000 guests a year and he wasn't satisfied with that. So he made his wing open to the public. Eventually, as he kept collecting more and more art, they had to build another building on the property to house everything. They eventually moved Getty's collection to the new Getty Center up on the hill and left only his Greek and Roman collection at the Greek and Roman inspired architecture buildings/grounds of his Villa.

It was in the middle of the storm while we were there. Raining off and on all day. But we had a great time playing should I grab an umbrella at the exit of every doorway. After a delicious meal at the cafe, we explored the grounds and gardens, the buildings, the ampitheater and the art. Overall, I enjoyed the grounds, gardens and architecture, but the art got a little repetitive as it was all statues, busts, and objects. There were one or two things that I remember seeing in my old art history classes (which is always interesting to me). But the most enjoyable thing was really just hanging out and goofing around in this beautiful place.

For instance, there were these statues posing by the water in the middle of the villa courtyard. But there was one space left open..begging to be stepped upon and strike a similar pose of the statues...but as I approached, they placed this tiny sign that said "keep off". Edged on by my entourage I jumped up for a quick picture. Waited a few moments and jumped off. Later Sarah told me that as I stepped up, two dark figures appeared and started making a B-line for me, but then vanished as they got word of some other patron skipping rocks across the reflection pool.



A QUICK TOUR:

The entrance to the grounds.


You come out of the entrance at the top of the ampitheater overlooking the main building entrance.


The view through the main building entrance through the courtyard, through the other side on the building, to the round fountain and ending with the mosaic waterfall fountain. This arrangement of the grounds is very Greek.


This is the view looking back through the villa.


This is the mosaic fountain at the end.


This is the view from the garden on the side.



That concludes our tour. And now onto the days models.

The gang...singing in the rain.


My Cutie posing in front of a column.


My Cuties posing in the garden and on the steps ;)





Sarah looking fondly at one of the Roman statues.


Jordan giving me the stink eye for no deserved reason what-so-ever.


Jordan posing with one angry and one concerned man.


Nice try buddy, but I think he as a few thousand years on you.


This is the face that Sarah gives you when you almost drop her mobile and break it into a million pieces...almost.


We had Kris taking pictures of us together when a group of photographers walked by and one of them stopped and posed us like this... Thanks for the tip stranger!


That concludes our day at the villa. We did go to dinner and tried some peruvian food that was amazing! It's like Mongolian and Mexican had a golden baby. We spent the night at Sarah's place and set off in the morning to get Sarah her annual pass and spend another day at Disneyland (also known as day 4 of our vacation).

See all the shots from the villa HERE